Nutrition-wise blog

Go green for the planet

Earth Day is just around the corner, and I've been thinking about recycling.

Although I try to stick to the mantra of "reduce, reuse and recycle," I admit that I can do more on the recycle part. We have a huge recycling bin, but we seldom fill and put it out. I still toss some cans and bottles into the regular trash. So I've decided to change.

In looking into recycling, I found out that the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency has a handy app that estimates the energy benefits of recycling household items rather than putting them in the landfill.

The app translates the energy saved by recycling common food or household containers into electricity with estimates of how long that much electricity can power a 60 watt equivalent compact fluorescent lamp (CFL) bulb, a laptop or other items.

Here are some examples:

Energy saved would power a ...

Item to be recycled

60 watt CFL bulb for:

laptop computer for:

1 aluminum can

20 hours

5.2 hours

1 plastic bottle

9.8 hours

2.5 hours

1 glass bottle

8 hours

2.1 hours

1 plastic grocery bag

1.3 hours

20 minutes

1 magazine

1.1 hour

20 minutes

This is pretty impressive. It makes me want to take a few extra steps to the recycle bin.

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